At a glance
- Busuu is best for learners who want real native speakers checking their work. Speakle is best for learners who write well and freeze when speaking.
- Where Busuu is strong: A community of native speakers.
- Where it puts its weight: Community correction is asynchronous.
- The research: speaking improves by producing language, not only recognising it; the figures below show what the published studies measured.
- Sources: 11 references, including Busuu's own public pages, checked 2026-09-26.
Our verdict
The short answer
Speakle gives you feedback the moment you finish speaking, while the pressure is still real, plus live video coaches, real learners to practise with face to face, and a CEFR course from A1 to C2. Busuu's community corrects the exercises you submit later; Speakle is built to make you fast, clear and confident in the moment.
- Busuu is best for
- Learners who want real native speakers checking their work
- Speakle is best for
- Learners who write well and freeze when speaking
Looking for a Busuu alternative?
The best Busuu alternative for speaking gives you feedback while you are still talking, not days later. Speakle answers every spoken session straight away with scores and the one thing to fix, runs a CEFR course from A1 to C2, and gives you real people too: video calls with other learners at your level and clubs of learners who share your first language. It is free to start.
Busuu and Speakle side by side
6 things people compare, answered for each.
To feel the difference between feedback later and feedback now, take the free speaking test: one answer, scored at once, no account.
The research: Busuu, feature by feature
We read Busuu's own website, help pages and app listings and wrote down what it publicly offers on each of the lines a speaking learner cares about. Each line links to the page it came from. Where we could not find a public statement the table says so, rather than guessing.
What Busuu and Speakle each offer, feature by feature
| Feature | Busuu | Speakle |
|---|---|---|
| How you practise speaking | Offers a 'Speaking practice' feature with pronunciation practice built around videos of native speakers, plus AI 'Conversations' with a built-in speaking partner. Learners can also submit spoken exercises to the community for feedback. [5] | Every session is spoken: you answer in your own words, and a live AI coach holds whole conversations with you. |
| AI conversation | Busuu Conversations lets learners practise two-way spoken dialogues about everyday scenarios with an AI partner and get AI feedback. It is part of the Complete English and Spanish courses and available to English and Spanish learners across all 16 interface languages. [6] | A scored speaking session every day on the free plan; on paid plans, a live AI video coach for interviews, debates, travel, IELTS practice and open conversation. |
| Pronunciation feedback | An AI speech-recognition tool grades the learner's spoken sentences and highlights words to improve, with personalised suggestions. Full AI feedback is for English and Spanish learners. [5] | Every sound scored with rhythm and intonation, on a path ordered by your first language, then checked in your own unplanned speech. |
| Course structure | Lessons follow the CEFR, with content running from A1 to C1. [7] | A course of 109 units from A1 to C2, where every step is a task you say out loud. |
| Human teachers | Offers Live Lessons with certified teachers (1:1 or groups of up to 5) through its business (B2B) offering. [8] | No tutors to book. Schools and teachers can run their classes on Speakle. |
| Other learners | An online Community of native and fluent speakers gives feedback and tips on learners' written and spoken exercises; learners can help others in return. [7] | Video conversation matches you with another learner at your level for about ten minutes, then coaches you both. |
| Help in your own language | Has 16 interface languages; its speaking features for English learners work across all of them. [5] | Hints, corrections and explanations in Arabic, Hindi, Japanese, Korean, Malay, Thai, Vietnamese, Turkish or Portuguese. |
| Exam preparation | Busuu Premium includes an 'English for Academic Studies' course and an 'English Exam Success' course, which Busuu positions as support for TOEFL preparation. [9] | IELTS speaking practice under exam conditions with the live coach, with a report for each part (an estimate, not an official score). |
| Free access | Free to sign up and learn, with ads; a subscription unlocks all features. Free learners can try two speaking lessons. [10] | A free plan with one scored speaking session every day, with no card. |
| Languages taught | Up to 14 languages, including English, Spanish, French, German, Japanese, Chinese, Korean, Arabic and Turkish. [11] | English only. |
| Where it runs | Available on iOS (App Store), Android (Google Play) and the web. [10] | Web and Android (Google Play), with the iPhone app in early access. |
Busuu: read on its own public pages, checked 2026-09-26. Features change; the numbered sources show where each line came from. No prices are listed because they vary by country and change often.
Use the community for accuracy and Speakle for speed.On using Busuu and Speakle together
Which one should you choose?
Choose Busuu if
Your main goal is written English, and you like the idea of submitting exercises for community members to correct in their own time, alongside a course in several languages.
Choose Speakle if
You want to speak with confidence in real time. Speakle gives you feedback the moment you finish speaking, live video coaches, practice with other learners face to face, a CEFR course from A1 to C2, and every mistake kept until it stops, so you get faster and clearer every week.
Start with the free speaking test, which needs no account. Then create a free account: the free plan includes a scored speaking session every day, with no card, and the first one takes five minutes.
What Busuu is, and what it does well
What Busuu is
Busuu is a CEFR-aligned course with an unusual addition: a community of native speakers who correct the speaking and writing exercises you submit. It also offers AI pronunciation feedback, an AI conversation partner and teacher-led live lessons.
What Busuu is genuinely better at
A community of native speakers. Busuu lets other members read the exercises you submit and suggest how a native speaker would put it, which is a friendly idea and a nice complement to a course, especially for written English.
Where its design puts its weight
Community correction is asynchronous. You submit, you wait, you read the correction later, and the moment of pressure you were trying to practise has long passed. It is excellent for accuracy and cannot train retrieval speed, because nothing you do at your own pace can.
What you get with Speakle
- 109course units, A1 to C2
- 112word collections
- 49grammar chapters, explained in your language
- 12world accents to train your ear
- 9native languages for explanations
One course, every level
| Item | Value (h) |
|---|---|
| A1 | 90 to 100 |
| A2 | 180 to 200 |
| B1 | 350 to 400 |
| B2 | 500 to 600 |
| C1 | 700 to 800 |
| C2 | 1,000 to 1,200 |
Cambridge English estimates that each level takes roughly another two hundred hours of guided learning. The hours vary with the learner and with how much they practise between lessons, which is why a little speaking every day matters more than an occasional long session.
Source: Cambridge English (2026) Cambridge describes these as a guideline only.
Speakle’s feedback is immediate on purpose. A daily session is one topic, about a minute, answered out loud, and the report comes straight back: pronunciation, fluency, grammar, vocabulary and coherence, the transcript it judged, and the one thing to fix first. On paid plans the live AI video coach adds real-time conversations: a trip from the airport to the hotel that earns a stamp at each stop, or IELTS practice run part by part, with a report on how you built each answer. That IELTS report deliberately gives no band, because a transcript cannot fairly show grammar or pronunciation; the scored session, which hears your voice, is where the estimate comes from.
Speakle · the English practice app for fluency and confidence
One app for everything that gets you speaking
Most apps train one piece: words, sounds or a chat window. Speakle puts the whole road to fluent, confident English in one place, and every part of it ends with you speaking.
Live coachFace to face with an AI coach, on videoJob interviews, debates, travel, IELTS speaking or an open conversation. The coach stays in role for the whole call and nothing is scripted.
ReportsA report after every callAn interview ends in a hiring decision, a debate is won or lost, a trip earns a stamp at each stop.
Every sessionYour speaking, measuredPronunciation, fluency, grammar, vocabulary and coherence, with a CEFR level and the one thing to fix first.
PronunciationPronunciation from your first languageSounds your language merges come first; sounds it already gives you are skipped.
PeopleReal learners, on videoTen minutes with another learner at your level, then coaching on what you both said.
CourseA course where every step is spoken109 units from A1 to C2. Each step is a real task you say out loud, not tiles to tap.
Using Busuu and Speakle together
Use the community for accuracy and Speakle for speed. Send your written answers to Busuu’s native speakers, who will tell you when something is technically fine but not how anyone would say it, and do your spoken practice in Speakle, where the feedback arrives immediately and the pressure is closer to a real conversation. Accuracy and speed are separate skills, and each of these is built around one of them.
The short version of the argument
Recognising
- Tap the right option
- Match the pairs
- Repeat a sentence you were given
What most practice trains
Producing
- Find the words yourself
- Say them out loud
- While someone waits for you
What speaking needs
Recognising the right answer and producing it are different skills, and most practice trains the first. Tapping the right option, matching pairs and repeating a sentence you were given can all be done without finding a single word yourself, which is why people who understand English well still freeze when they have to speak it. We call this the recognition trap. The way out is spoken practice, short and daily, answered in your own words. The full explanation, with the memory research behind it, is its own page.
| Item | Condition | Value (%) |
|---|---|---|
| After 5 minutes | Read once, recalled 3 times | 71 |
| After 5 minutes | Read 3 times, recalled once | 78 |
| After 5 minutes | Read 4 times | 83 |
| After 1 week | Read once, recalled 3 times | 61 |
| After 1 week | Read 3 times, recalled once | 56 |
| After 1 week | Read 4 times | 40 |
Students who reread a passage four times remembered the most after five minutes, and the least a week later. Students who read it once and then tried to recall it three times forgot far less. Pulling words out of your own memory, which is what speaking asks of you, is what made them last.
Source: Roediger & Karpicke (2006) Experiment 2: university students recalling prose passages; share of idea units recalled.
| Item | Value (%) |
|---|---|
| Read aloud | 76 |
| Read silently | 59.8 |
| Never shown (wrongly recognised) | 21.9 |
The same people read some words aloud and some silently. Afterwards they recognised the words they had said aloud clearly more often. Saying something makes it more memorable than only seeing it, one reason spoken practice beats silent tapping for anything you want to say later.
Source: MacLeod et al. (2010) Experiment 1, 44 university students. The benefit appeared when each person read some words aloud and some silently.
| Item | Value (%) |
|---|---|
| 20 min | 47.2 |
| 1 h | 37.3 |
| 9 h | 27.6 |
| 1 day | 31.7 |
| 2 days | 23 |
| 6 days | 16.8 |
| 31 days | 4.1 |
A modern replication of Ebbinghaus measured how much faster a list could be relearned after each delay. Most of the benefit is gone within a day or two unless the material is used again, which is why a daily return to speaking matters more than a long session once a week.
Source: Murre & Dros (2015) One adult learning nonsense syllables; "savings" is the share of relearning time saved, not the share remembered.
Questions people ask
Is Speakle a Busuu alternative?
Yes. Speakle gives you a CEFR course from A1 to C2, instant feedback on every spoken answer, live video coaches and real people to practise with on video. Busuu’s community corrects the exercises you submit; Speakle is built to get you talking, live.
Does Busuu have speaking practice?
Yes: speaking exercises with AI pronunciation feedback, an AI conversation partner, and teacher-led live lessons. The difference is emphasis, since Speakle is built entirely around spoken sessions.
Can I use Busuu and Speakle together?
Yes. Native-speaker corrections on your writing in one, fast spoken practice in the other.
Which is better for a complete beginner?
Speakle is a great place to begin. Its course starts at A1, with explanations in ten native languages and short spoken tasks from the first day, so you learn to say English as you learn it, not years later. The free speaking test shows you exactly where to start.
More comparisons
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gamified courseSpeakle vs Duolingo
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Where to go next
Product names and logos are trademarks of their respective owners, shown only to identify the products compared. Speakle is not affiliated with or endorsed by them.
References
- Cambridge University Press & Assessment. (2026). Guided learning hours. Cambridge English Support Site. support.cambridgeenglish.org/hc/en-gb/articles/202838506-Guided-learning-hours Checked 2026-09-26.
- Roediger, H. L., III, & Karpicke, J. D. (2006). Test-enhanced learning: Taking memory tests improves long-term retention. Psychological Science, 17(3), 249-255. doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9280.2006.01693.x Checked 2026-09-26.
- MacLeod, C. M., Gopie, N., Hourihan, K. L., Neary, K. R., & Ozubko, J. D. (2010). The production effect: Delineation of a phenomenon. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 36(3), 671-685. doi.org/10.1037/a0018785 Checked 2026-09-26.
- Murre, J. M. J., & Dros, J. (2015). Replication and analysis of Ebbinghaus' forgetting curve. PLOS ONE, 10(7), e0120644. doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0120644 Checked 2026-09-26.
- Busuu, public page at investor.chegg.com. investor.chegg.com/Press-Releases/press-release-details/2024/Busuu-Launches-AI-powered-Speaking-Practice-to-Boost-Real-World-Conversation-Skills/default.aspx Checked 2026-09-26.
- Busuu, public page at investor.chegg.com. investor.chegg.com/Press-Releases/press-release-details/2024/Busuu-Launches-New-AI-Conversation-Practice-Feature/default.aspx Checked 2026-09-26.
- Busuu, public page at busuu.com. www.busuu.com/en/about Checked 2026-09-26.
- Busuu, public page at business.busuu.com. business.busuu.com/product/corporate-language-training-live-classes Checked 2026-09-26.
- Busuu, public page at busuu.com. www.busuu.com/en/course/toefl-preparation Checked 2026-09-26.
- Busuu, public page at busuu.com. www.busuu.com/en Checked 2026-09-26.
- Busuu, public page at apps.apple.com. apps.apple.com/us/app/busuu-language-learning/id379968583 Checked 2026-09-26.